


Ink Across a Hidden Canvas

by RegalMisfortune



Category: The Yogscast
Genre: High School AU, I have legitimately never written Sips or the Hats before, Pranks, Swearing, Tattoos, because it really is, body piercings, but at the same time it isn't, mentions of same-sex couples, or a lot, possible bullying/harassment, pranks that are probably not really pranks, so if this is terrible, they push the boundaries a bit, think of it as a character practice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-07
Updated: 2015-03-07
Packaged: 2018-03-16 16:32:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3495260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RegalMisfortune/pseuds/RegalMisfortune
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This started off as a joke involving spacey tattoos, but then it evolved into this.<br/>Also a series because I am going to actually write several pieces about this even if it's utter garbage for my own selfish personal reasons.<br/>I also wrote this in the middle of a presentation at school, so I apologize for any errors/weird sentence structures.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Ink Across a Hidden Canvas

**Author's Note:**

> This started off as a joke involving spacey tattoos, but then it evolved into this.  
> Also a series because I am going to actually write several pieces about this even if it's utter garbage for my own selfish personal reasons.  
> I also wrote this in the middle of a presentation at school, so I apologize for any errors/weird sentence structures.

“Wow! You got another one! It’s so cool!” Sips grinned as he held out his arm to the small group of freshmen, letting them fawn over his newest addition of art on his body. Being the oldest student in school at the ripe age of twenty sure had its perks, as the senior could have the lower classmates ogle his array of tattoos and piercings in awe and jealousy. “The Cool Kid”, he was called by almost all of the students. “Miscreant,” was his teachers’ favorite word to describe the young adult who successfully failed his freshman year so spectacularly that he had to repeat. Having a weird birthday also helped him get the throne of oldest pupil in the school, and he took every advantage of it.

Today’s tattoo was one of the more cliché designs one could get- a skull and roses- but it was wonderfully done. The lines were not smeared or blurred and the colors were vibrant against his pale skin. He had many others, but only the ones on his arms he was allowed to show on school grounds without getting suspended for indecency (although that didn’t stop him from going shirtless in the locker rooms, the only place where he was allowed to strip down but the audience was limited).

Sips looked up from the freshman admiring his tattoos, spotting a familiar face amongst the throng of other students mucking about the hallways.

“Hey Trott!” he called, using his free hand to wave towards the brunette.

“Attracting attention again?” Trott asked with a smirk as he sidled up beside the older student, using his hands to shoo away the freshmen- not that they needed much prompting. Trott was one of a trio who were notorious for causing… pranks… if dunking that one kid into the dumpsters in the back of the school was considered a prank. Some of things they did Sips was sure that they would’ve been caught for bullying or harassment by the administration if it wasn’t for the fact that they never targeted the same person twice. Or, at least the same person multiple times in the row. Sips didn’t mind partaking in some of the milder pranks the trio conducted, like filling someone’s locker entirely full of glitter. Those pranks were utterly hilarious, Sips would give them that, but some of the other pranks, like the time they had ‘accidentally’ locked one of the students in a janitor’s closet after school and ‘forgot’ them there until the night-shift found them were a bit cruel even for his own low moral standards, especially when everyone knew that the kid was claustrophobic.

Still, he was willing to ignore the few mishaps for their overall hilarious shenanigans.

“Where’s the other two gang members?” Sips asked leaning against the lockers, chewing on one of his lip rings.

“Ross is busy trying to serenade to the cheerleaders,” the younger replied, jutting a thumb towards the general direction of where Ross would be. “He’s howling up the wrong tree if you ask me. Two-thirds of them are lesbians.”

Sips snickered, shaking his head at the irony. “What about Smiffy? Trying to get laid too?”

“Nah, he went to grab a thing of coffee. He should be here any minute.”

Speak of the devil, Sips caught sight of Smiffy’s familiar orange hair bobbing through the throng of students. Many of them scurried out of the way, but a few did not notice his approach and would have been run into if one of their friends had not pulled them out of the way. He had almost made it to the pair when someone popped out from between the bodies and ran smack into him.

Smiffy and the other student stumbled, the lid of Smiffy’s coffee popping off and spilling hot liquid everywhere- on the floor, on Smiffy’s shoes, and all over the front of the other student’s long-sleeved shirt.

“The fuck?!” Smiffy cursed, nearly dropping the cup entirely as a few droplets of the hot liquid sploshed over his fingers. “Watch where you’re going, you prick! Jeez!”

The kid- the name escaped Sips at the moment- seemed to curl in on himself as he bent down to pick up his dropped jacket that miraculously managed to escape being drenched in coffee, mumbling some sort of apology before disappearing into the crowd with shoulders hunched, his knuckles white as he gripped the straps of his backpack.

“You alright there, mate?” Trott asked as Smiffy finished his approach towards them.

“Physically yes, emotionally no,” he said with a dramatic sigh, peering into his now mostly empty cup. “Now I got nothing to drink and my shoes are going to smell like Starbucks for all eternity!”

“Who was that bozo anyway?” Sips asked, craning his neck to peer in the direction of where the other student went to as if hopeful to see where he’d went.

“Oh, that’s that Xephos kid. You know, the one who doesn’t go to gym like the rest of us plebeians?”

Sips hummed in thought, his head bobbing in acknowledgement. He remembered the kid now, the one who always wore coats, long sleeved button-ups and dress slacks who seemed to haunt the library during breaks and lunch. If the rumor mill was correct, Xephos had moved in sometime in the beginning of the year, was every teacher’s pet due to his perfect grades, and made everyone jealous that he was excused from gym classes (they were utter hell and anyone who could make through one class without some form of soreness was most definitely going to be in detention later). He remembered seeing the kid around a few times, but he was never hanging around with anyone and he never heard him speak to anyone, not even to teachers. That inaudible murmur to Smiffy was probably the closest thing Sips had seen as some form of speech from the kid. No one even knew what grade he was in, as he took a lot of AP courses, but it wasn’t like anyone was going to ask him. Xephos was a social outcast, a weirdo, the perfect student whom nobody liked because he obviously was using his good grades and perfect attendance to get out of doing gym class and even speaking to him was some sort of social taboo.

“You know,” Sips said after moment. “I think I’ll go after that kid. Maybe hide his bag or something while he’s busy dealing with the mess on his shirt.”

“You should totally steal his coat! Take his change in clothes! Leave him with nothing to wear and be confined to the bathroom unless he wants to take the walk of shame to the nurse’s office!” Smiffy cackled, and Trott soon joined in.

“That sounds like a great plan Smiff,” Sips said, slapping the younger man on the back. “Wish me luck. I’ll be in and out before you know it.”

“Give us his clothes when you get them!” Smiffy called as Sips pushed himself from the locker to go after his target. Sips waved his hand in the air, signaling that he heard and yes, he would do what they asked him. The worst that could happen was that the kid was going to get detention for walking shirtless down a hallway and the trio, nicknamed the ‘Hats’, would fly his clothes off the flagpole. Nothing but the kid’s pride was going to be harmed in this prank.

Sips went to the nearest bathroom, knowing that the kid wouldn’t risk going to the locker rooms to attempt to clean the coffee off his clothes before it dried, but when he opened the door and stepped inside, he wasn’t prepared for what he saw.

The kid was in there alright, but his jacket was hung up on one of the nearby stall doors. His shirt was off and in the sink, the water running to soak the coffee-stained fabric. It wasn’t the fact that the kid was standing there with no shirt on, he knew to expect that, but it was what was under the shirt and jacket that shocked Sips.

It was as if the kid had dipped his right arm into space, dark ink stained with swirls of galaxies and nebulae stretching from his upper wrist to halfway pass his elbow. What looked like a dragon holding one of those dorky D&D die was partially visible on his half turned shoulder and he could see what appeared to be a portion of some sort of Celtic/Nordic tribal thing disappearing under the waist of his pants.

The door slamming shut was what startled the pair; Sips out of his staring and notifying Xephos that he wasn’t alone.

Wide blue eyes turned to stare at Sips, his body turning to expose even more body art on his left side in a colorful image of Anubis standing at attention with an evening Egyptian background.

Sips couldn’t believe it. Here was Mr. Perfect, teacher’s pet, absolute smarty-pants standing here in the bathroom with almost as many tattoos as he did. It was if he was seeing this kid in a new light. Hell he actually was seeing him in a new light. His eyes trailed over Xephos, noticing things that he never actually did before. He saw how his hair was slightly curled at the ends, the splatter of faint freckles across his nose and cheekbones, how much taller the kid actually was in comparison to Sips. He also noticed how much older than he appeared to any of Sips’ friends and acquaintances, perhaps only a couple of months to a year younger than Sips was himself. Yet there was something more mature and aged in his eyes than Sips had seen even in some teachers’ that made him appear several years older than Sips.

“Who the hell did your tats?” The words fell out of Sips’ mouth before he even thought about it. “They’re the best fucking thing I have ever seen in my life.” It was true, though; Xephos’ body art was better than his was, and he got his at a place one city over that came with celebrity recommendations.

The taller kid’s cheeks tinted pink, either from the embarrassment of being caught, the compliment, or both. “From the Black Dragon Tattoo Parlor,” he murmured, the words.

Sips whistled, walking towards Xephos and around him, eying the wonderful artwork. There was some sort of clockwork patterns and a very realistic bumblebee on his back and upper hip, but leaving a large swath of skin on his back and lower shoulders for future additions or one large piece. But even the giant bee was artistically done, the colors blending well and to a point as if it hadn’t been done on flesh at all but on canvas.

Xephos eyed Sips warily, his hand slowly rising to turn the faucet off. Sips rolled his shoulders back, a casual smile on his lips. “You should totally take me sometime. Fuck, we could get matching tats.”

The taller student pressed his lips together, forming a thin line. He shifted his weight, clearly uncomfortable about the situation. “Look, I-“

Whatever argument he was about to counter Sips with was drowned out by the sharp ear-splitting ring of the bell signaling the first class of the day. Xephos let out a quiet curse, impressing Sips even more than he had already with his tattoos as the young student fumbled for his jacket, pulling it over his bare chest and zipping it up to hide the beautiful artwork and returning to his normal drab appearance. “I’m going to be late,” he said hurriedly, yanking his backpack off the floor and over his shoulder as his long legs carried him to the doorway.

“Wait!” Sips called out, but the door was already swinging shut as Xephos departed. “Well, shit.” He ran a hand over his face, fingers brushing against the twin piercings on his lower lip. Xephos had turned out to be nothing like he’d thought or the rumors panned him out to be. Sips wanted to know more about this strange quiet enigma, but with him scurrying away like a startled rabbit wasn’t going to get him anywhere closer to his new-found tattoo pal.

Sips eyes trailed to the sink that the other student had abandoned, his lips quirking up into a sly smile as he gazed at the wet bundle of fabric laying in the basin. If Xephos was going to play hard to get in school, then Sips was just going to find an excuse to meet up with him again outside of it, and it was only going to take one text to a friend to find out where exactly this tattoo parlor was.


End file.
